Connor.

  Connor watched the concerningly attractive arachnid abomination leave with equal parts fascination and wonder. How such a rge creature could openly defy what made his own weight outright mortally dangerous from a simir height was—honestly, just a bit unfair…

  "You deserved it, you know…" Victor said, now looking at Conner, even if his expression was ghostly and pale, "Maybe not all of it, but you're not bmeless! No matter how you try and spin it..."

  "What happened to the guildsman?" Connor instead asked, not interested in jousting with the other boy now that he'd spoken his peace.

  For his part, Whiskers sighed as though he'd been expecting some sort of feral fight, some explosion of drama and unrestrained fury! The decided ck of which seemed to outright drain him just as quickly as a nightly piss. After a few moments, he hung his head, gaze distant and unseeing...

  "Got himself killed… Took the monster's head clean off, but it must have been some sort of trick… Made him step out and expose himself and, the moment he did—he died…"

  "You didn't help him?"

  "My arrows bounced off its ass," Victor replied, his voice ft. "The man had a gold medallion and was killed in a single blow. What pray to tell, do you expect I could have done?"

  "Shouldn't a goldie be capable of besting any dungeon monster in this pce? I mean, there's only one floor, and we're on it! Seems a trite suspicious if you ask me."

  "The fuck does it even matter?"

  "Quite a lot if you think about it; after all, if he'd really been who he said he was, you wouldn't be tied to that pilr!" Connor giggled, earning himself a strange look from the other boy, who clearly thought him mad.

  Yet, it was quite the opposite! Connor had received an epiphany like he'd never known! Divine revetion! A new understanding of the cosmos... And the way he now viewed the world would be forever changed...

  This simple shift in fate hadn't come by means of learning about the giant sentient spider woman, but rather his shattered faith in what he'd thought to have understood about his life.

  For the longest time, he'd assumed the nobility was the highest privilege.

  To become one was to become—someone! To be respected and feared! To possess the qualities that would allow him to find a loving wife and meaningful existence in the world.

  It was title.

  It was acceptance,

  It was proof that one was better than everyone else around them!

  And, he had been led to believe that, one day, he would stand at the head of his very own noble house and exist amidst the honored peerage that had ruled the city-states of Pansuu for untold generations...

  If he only acted like them.

  If he only deferred to them.

  If he only stomached the way they spat his name as he passed them by...

  No. Connor was never going to be one of them. Even if he got a fancy letter from the emperor, even if he started calling himself lord. Even if the commoners of the city bowed as he commanded. They would not see him as an equal.

  They would never accept his admittance to their ranks, no matter who tried to make them accept that fact. Connor would belong in name alone while shunned and ostracized by his supposed equals.

  And yet, despite his father owning the rights to significant debts of such illustrious families, despite their treating of his family name like mud, despite all their supposed superiority, he was right where they were.

  Right within the clutches of a monster that saw nothing different between them beyond the potential of nutrients.

  It really made a man wonder what the real difference was...

  He certainly couldn't see it, and neither could the spider!

  So what was it?

  Not magic as the current archmage of the college was a man born in the slums!

  Not physical prowess as Delmonte was stuck in the same webs as he, trapped with no hope to escape.

  Not money, and following Justinian reforms, not power save for what wealth and nd could afford oneself.

  Really, there weren't many things left after all was said and done… almost as if there were nothing special at all... Nothing but an idea. One championed by those that clung to the vestiges of its history like leeches did his ass after a swim in a ke.

  It was too bad, really.

  Too little, too te… as had he somehow managed to survive this day, Connor imagined all the different ways he could prove that the title of nobility was—meaningless as his own person would soon be transformed into a spider's shit...

  The soft patter of spear-like feet returned Connor from his musings, the muffled murmuring of a certain golden-haired asshole sparking his ire as he watched the miserable cunt get deposited on the ground where he continued to wriggle and squirm, his eyes wide with terror, face smothered by a tight and thick bundle of silk.

  She'd gagged him because, surprise, even the monster found him insufferable to listen to!

  How—appropriate…

  He was about to say something towards the effect when, suddenly, the spider called out to the ceiling with cupped hands.

  "Okay Abby! Everyone's—secure!"

  Connor cocked his head, momentarily uncertain as to who the spider was talking to. Did she have—children that she intended to feed? Well, it would make a kind of horrible sense after a fashion, even ignoring how a dungeon monster could have offspring, but… His uncertainties were availed of him shortly after when a small and bright dot seemed to manifest from the darkness…

  The tiny thing, hardly the size of his clenched fist, flew at high speeds and in a trailing arc of golden sparkles before it nded on the spider's shoulder and looked him right in the eyes…

  "Wow… they look—different from the usual ones, don't they?"

  "They also had a high-level bodyguard."

  “Ugh… nobles then…” The small creature sneered, looking as though she wanted to spit on them. "Worst of the worst… I don't know If I want their kind dirtying my precious project's bloodline."

  "I don't know, the blond one is pretty hot…" The monster mused, her cold gaze falling upon Arthur, who seemed as transfixed as everyone else by the fey creature's presence.

  "He's—yeah… okay… sort of snacky... But the others can definitely go… The mousy one's no good, too ugly, and the fat one is—well… I'd prefer the first option…"

  "We don't have to pick right now, Abby."

  "I know, but I really want to, you know, get started! The first batch will still take time... And I'm going to be really pushing things!"

  "You can't wait a day to see who else there is?"

  "No! The noble brat will do fine. And don't say someone else more handsome than him will show up because we both know the odds they also run into you are slim as fuck."

  "Alright!" The spider said, sighing as her gaze drifted, somewhat ominously, to a suddenly frightened Victor who did not find her sudden attention—desirable…

  "Can I ask a question?" Connor chirped before the spider had taken so much as a step, garnering a look of everyone in the room. "Are you the dungeon?"

  "I am." The pixie huffed, unching off her perch to hover in front of Connors's face while gring daggers at him with curled lips.

  "And you're—awake again?"

  "Obviously!" Abby, the—dungeon, procimed, snorting at the apparent stupidity and failure to recognize her majesty. "But that's no thanks to you assholes!"

  "Not me, actually!" He continued, a wide and malicious grin forming on his face while his eyes twinkled with delight. "I'm not a noble, you see; they won't let me in.

  But, you might be rather interested to know that you currently have the firstborn son of Lord Baxton Tinterwell wrapped up and on the sand. And," he added, looking towards a now very pale Whiskers, "The favored if not second-born son of Lord Delmonte, two scions of the very same six original houses that bound you."

  The pixie froze, her wings not even maintaining the supposed illusion of movement, the creature just—floating where she was before; slowly, she turned with furrowed brows and narrowed eyes.

  Flitting over to Victor, who, in turn, opened his mouth but found his words failing him as the spider loomed behind her.

  The small woman seemed to scrutinize the boy for several long minutes before turning slightly to her rge companion.

  "Kate, can you put the other boy up here, not the fat one, goldilocks." Her final word was spoken with equal parts scorn and dripping venom, and the once more squirming Arthur was plucked from the sand and, after a little cleaning and extra webbing, stuck directly beside Victor.

  Like she had before, the small woman seemed to analyze every valley and ridge of his features, her inspection utterly silent before letting out a small huff and returning to a sembnce of her prior self.

  "It's hard to tell, but this one definitely looks—familiar…"

  "He's got a family crest on his armor!" Connor sang, earning him a baleful look from both of his once friends. Well, tit for tat assholes, now who was ughing? "Victor does as well, though it's on his pel. House mottos, coat of arms, and family name all."

  "Who is this other boy?" The pixie demanded, looking somewhat curiously at the spider, who shrugged but answered all the same. "He's one of their—friends? supposedly… I mean, you were the one who watched them beat him within an inch of his life, so…"

  "Yeah, fair point. I'm getting so forgetful these days..." Then, the small creature flew over to Connor to consider him again. "You're—Connor, right?"

  "Yes, you're grace."

  "Grace?"

  "Seems fitting?" He tried; admittedly, he was hamming it up a little, mostly to get under the other two's skin, of which Victor had so recently been granted his own silken gag.

  "Well, Connor, while I do appreciate you bringing what you have to my attention, It's not going to spare your life, I'm afraid…"

  "What if we made a deal?"

  "Nope, sorry, not interested." The pixie snipped, floating away without a second gnce. "Katelyn will make sure your death isn't as bad as the others."

  "I can help you get revenge!" He called, and, just like that, he knew he had something.

  The dungeon froze again, peeking over her shoulder to regard him very carefully… "My family is exorbitantly wealthy to the point many nobles, including two of the old houses, owe us a considerable small fortune! If you let me go, you don't even need to help me because I want to ruin them as well!"

  "Kate." The pixie breathed, considering Connor for a time, "Please give him another potion. I want to—talk with him ter…"

  "You're serious?"

  "Deadly…" The dungeon replied, eyes thunderous and filled with hatred.

  "Well, it was your rule about letting people go, so… whatever…"

  The far less eloquent and cultured spider approached him, pulling a vial of crimson liquid as though from the air itself, raising it to Connor's lips as he drank the offered potion with appreciation.

  His head had been absolutely killing him!

  Then, she gently began cutting him down, her sharp fingers carefully pulling back the silk of her cocoon until she caught him in her outright sacious embrace and put him down.

  It felt strange to be on his feet again and—free after so sure of his looming death, but he extended an arm to hold himself upright, once more, relying on the spider's graceful and warm legs for assistance.

  Oddly enough, given how normal the monster seemed, he felt her to be far less intimidating than she had not an hour before.

  "Thank you." He smiled, earning himself one in return. Which was a big win so far as living was concerned!

  "Are we still going forward with the pn?"

  "Don't know…" The dungeon replied, now uncertain of something that wasn't immediately clear to Connor.

  "You're not going to kill them?" He couldn't help but ask, both women looking his way with minor annoyance on the side of the pixie and indifference from the spider.

  "Oh, no, they're going to live for a long time, or as long as I can stretch it out… The handsome one will probably even enjoy it, in a manner of speaking. But only the parts of him that get to—stay attached...… I do need him to be somewhat healthy, but I have my ways…"

  "For the breeding program." the spider offered, her expression filled with dark amusement that only transitioned to a chuckle as the young man in question finally stopped moving, his eyes wide with horror.

  "...Breeding?"

  "Mmmhmm!" Then, in a conspiratorial tone, she added, "I'm not really a spider, by the way, but it is a lot more fun than I thought it would be! Wonderfully sadistic by nature!"

  "So… are you making a—human farm?" Connor asked, trying to get a hold of exactly what Arhtur's fate actually entailed because, so far, he wasn't exactly happy the boy would be surviving this mess.

  "Well, that's the thing," Kate replied, "The whole reason I'm a spider right now is to see if we can create a new breed of monsters through interspecies copution. Handsome is going to be my stud and, if everything goes to pn, the father of a brand-new generation of nightmares that are all, well, like me."

  "Oh gods…" Connor whispered, horrified as he was infinitely intrigued! "Do you think it will actually work?"

  "Mmmmm… I'm—eighty percent sure…"

  "And... after... the dungeon will have an army of giant spider women? One that will... be dangerous enough for it to possibly invade just like, just like..." He whispered, almost in awe of what he'd so blunderingly stumbled into.

  "It is the pn," The spider admitted conversationally.

  "And you're telling me this because there's still a very high chance I'm going to die…"

  "Yeah… but on the bright side, I won't eat you like I'm going to Lord Delmonte; I've been sort of excited to try the spider way of doing things… It could be all the arachnid instincts talking, but the urge is rather potent… He's not going to have a lot of fun while I individually dissolve various parts of his body for consumption..."

  Though Connor didn't know precisely how spiders ate their prey beyond some basics, given how terrifying they were, even when small, he felt his darkening heart jump for joy!

  Knowing that Whiskers would be getting exactly what he deserved was emotionally therapeutic. The spider, however, well, she might just be a little deranged; best he trod carefully around her and mind his manners.

  "So, if you mate with Arthur and he—sires you're brood…" Connor began, his words sounding as though spoken through the haze of a feverish dream. "The children will be like, you?"

  "That is the goal… Spider me, obviously."

  "And they'd view him, because they're monsters, likely not as their father but—food?"

  The spider made to answer but—hesitated while cocking her head, with even the pixie seeming to perk at his comment but not openly turning to be a part of it.

  "They—will be very—spider-like…" She murmured thoughtfully, "If their instincts are anything like what I'm fighting against, then… they wouldn't see anyone as a family but, instead—fresh meat."

  "He's the one!" The pixie suddenly affirmed, floating back over to her spider friend with a forced air of casual apathy as though she'd arrived at her decision through some deep thought privy to only herself. "Golden boy gets to be the lucky winner. And our monster baby-daddy."

  "Is he also going to be their unwilling babysitter while tied up and surrounded by eggs?" The spider asked, her tone sardonic and clearly not missing a thing.

  For several seconds, Connor could see the horrible truth of it all. The dungeon's avatar all but bathing in the soothing insanity of her pn. She gnced back at the now fervently struggling Arthur, who was screaming through his gag.

  She gnced at Delmonte, who was silent as he grave, the expression on his face disgusted as it was wide with terror.

  Then, her hatefully glittering gaze fell back upon her monster, a maw filled with sharp and needle-like teeth splitting her face in a grotesque smile of sheer madness...

  "Maybe," The pixie giggled, the absolute joy radiating off the girl pin for all to bear witness, "we'll see how it all works out. But if it does, I'm totally going to munch popcorn while watching his children slowly hatch, then swarm him from head to toe..."

  The end.

  Madmcgee